SSTI Digest

The Kansas Technology Enterprise Corp. promoted Kevin Carr to the position of chief operations officer.

The Fuqua School of Business at Duke University announced that Jon Fjeld is the executive director of its recently unveiled Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation.

The Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship at the University of Maryland, College Park named Dan Goodman as its first technology commercialization fellow.

The 82nd Annual Congress of Cities in Charlotte, N.C., elected Jim Hunt, a councilmember of Clarksburg, W.Va., as the new president of the National League of Cities. Hunt follows Washington, D.C., Mayor Anthony A. Williams.

The Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM) selected Vicki Loise as its first executive director.

Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels named Mitch Maurer, president of the Indiana Economic Development Corporation (IEDC), as the new state secretary of commerce. Maurer replaces Pat Miller, who stepped down to resume her role as president and CEO of her company, Vera Bradley Designs, Inc.

BioMed SA, a recently founded technology council to promote the development of San Antonio’s health and bioscience community, selected Ann Stevens to serve as its first executive director.

Funding Supplement for Members Only in 2006 As long-time subscribers to the SSTI Weekly Digest know, during the past five years SSTI has published a separate element of the newsletter identifying federal and foundation funding opportunities that support either tech-based economic development directly or scientific inquiry and R&D.

After several months of debate regarding a number of economic development initiatives, Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm signed into law a major economic stimulus bill. However, unhappy with portions of a separate tax break package for businesses, the governor vetoed two of the 10 bills.

Gov. Granholm signed into law a bill creating the 21st Century Jobs Fund, first introduced in her State-of-the-State Speech earlier this year (see the Feb . 21 issue of the Digest). The new initiative appropriates $400 million over fiscal years 2006-07 from tobacco settlement money to provide immediate funds for job creation and to increase Michigan's high-technology economy, according to the governor's press office. Funding for the initiative will be focused in three areas:

At the end of November, President Bush signed the fiscal year 2006 Appropriations Bill for the Department of Energy & Water, H.R. 2419. A summary of the Administration's budget request for DOE is available in the Feb. 14 issue of the Digest. Highlights of the bill include:

Department of Energy

The Office of Science is funded at $3.63 billion, an increase of $33 million from the FY05 appropriations and $170 million beyond the Administration's request. Within the Office of Science, $290.6 million is slated for fusion sciences research, the same as the Administration's request. Other Office of Science initiatives include:

Note: This is the first in a series of articles SSTI will be running over the next several weeks to provide synopses of selected breakout sessions from SSTI's 9th Annual Conference, held Oct. 19-21, 2005, in Atlanta. Ideas for 2006 conference sessions can be forwarded to skinner@ssti.org. Look for more news on SSTI's 10th annual conference beginning in late winter.

The Oct. 21 morning conference session, Sound Strategies for Encouraging Regional Entrepreneurship, was presented by two dynamic speakers who offered an array of valuable lessons learned garnered through years of experience promoting growth through strategic science and technology strategies.

In another wing of the InterContinental Buckhead Atlanta, site of SSTI's 2005 conference, participants shared what their states and regions are doing in the area of encouraging the development and deployment of alternative energy. Lee Cheatham, executive director of the Washington Technology Center, and Karl Jessen, program director of industry support under the Massachusetts Renewable Energy Trust (RET), led the session.

Cheatham opened his presentation, highlighting the market potential for alternative energy. Worldwide energy use is estimated at 382 quadrillion British thermal units (BTU), Cheatham said. Between 1950 and 2004, energy use in the U.S. rose from 34.62 quadrillion BTU to 99.7 quadrillion BTU.